Almost every day now I hear some whiz kid trying to sell me on the idea that we should have IQ tests for political leaders to determine whether or not they are fit to lead the nation. This idea is mostly promoted by supporters of mainstream corporate democrats, the same corporate democrats that saw to it that you won’t get any expansion of job benefits by the way, who are scared to pieces that Trump will be president again. Of course these people have failed to realize that faking results on such a test would be quite easy to do. But I am not even going to go there because I do not have to. All I have to do is defer to the fact that cunning, ruthless, despotic leaders have mostly all had high IQs. If you do not believe me all you have to do is look at the Nazi regime and see that many of the higher ups scored well on IQ tests. Even Donald Trump scored well on his IQ test. So why are Trump’s supposed enemies now calling for the same test that despots have used to separate the good stock from the bad stock for the purposes of genocide and enslavement? Probably because social Darwinism, the idea that we can perfect the human race through selective breeding by pairing others with high IQs, good health, excellent grades and good genes, never really went away in America. In fact, I would argue that it has only grown in popularity ever since its creation. Social Darwinism, of course, was quite popular amongst most American Capitalists because it promotes “survival of the fittest” a term first coined by social Darwinist Herbert Spencer a full seven years before Charles Darwin published his Origin of Species. All over the supposedly “liberal” twitter sphere you will hear so called liberals saying that survival of the fittest is weeding out the conservatives who are refusing to get themselves vaccinated, most likely without understanding the term’s racist origins. Spencer believed that competition was most important and that those who could not or would not ruthlessly compete with others deserved to sit and spin. "Society advances," Spencer wrote, "where its fittest members are allowed to assert their fitness with the least hindrance." He went on to argue that the unfit should "not be prevented from dying out." Wow, well, isn’t that cute? Isn’t that grand? Liberal America is using a term that promotes killing others who may not be as smart as them or who may just not be as interested in philosophy as they are. Why do they believe that knowledge will save them from dictatorship? Germany was a very intelligent nation before Hitler ran in there and grabbed power. Pre Nazi Germany was an intellectual paradise and yet they were usurped by brute force, mostly because they refused to recognize the threat of social Darwinism, much like the United States is doing today. Spencer was also against welfare of any kind, and, much like the Democrats and Republicans of the day, considered welfare to the poor and needy to encourage laziness and vice. He opposed public schooling and even was against public health codes because he believed disease to be a natural occurrence that was meant to kill off those weaker than him. Were Spencer alive today, he would applaud Democrats and Republicans alike for allowing the poor to starve and for supporting testing of leaders to make sure that they have, as Trump stated, “the right stuff” to lead. Those who are arguing for these stupid IQ tests obviously did not pay attention in history class. Indeed, they are the ones who should be kept far away from leadership because, if they had their way, no one with even the slightest bit of compassion or empathy, which IQ tests cannot measure, would ever become a leader of note again. This lazy brand of politics must not only be ignored, it must be attacked, discouraged and mocked. We cannot allow those who would have a test measure the suitability of a leader to dictate actual policy. If this happens we are doomed to be a fascist nation. Truth hurts. Idiocy kills.